


Only You Can

by mountainsbeyondmountains



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M, Werewolves, White Walkers have been defeated, post end of the series, some fairytale vibes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-06
Updated: 2017-09-06
Packaged: 2018-12-24 12:15:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12012537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mountainsbeyondmountains/pseuds/mountainsbeyondmountains
Summary: After the war is won, Jon wargs into Ghost and disappears beyond the ruined Wall. Sansa has to go get him back.





	Only You Can

After the Battle for the Dawn was won, the last Targaryen, heir to the Iron Throne, the White Wolf, the Crow, the King who'd forsaken his crown, the Kneeler, the Lord Commander, the Bastard of Winterfell went north. He did it in the body of his wolf. He crossed the crumbling remnants of the Wall. It was melting, melting, melting into the rivers of Westeros, running through the craggy creeks of the North, seeping through the swamps of the Neck, coursing between the Twins and down into the Riverlands, spreading west and east and still further south until it gushed into the sea, steady as the life force spilling from severed wrists. He went against this current. He navigated between the bones, too numerous to count, slowly disintegrating into the soil that would grow the crops that would feed their descendents they'd given their lives to save. He didn't make a sound. The tracks he left in the snow (still hot with blood from the war) weren't hard to follow, though.

They sent those they thought might still care after him.

First, the Priestess of R'hllor, the deceived king's shadow, the red witch, Melony of Lot Seven. She'd brought him back once, hadn't she? And the cold was no concern of hers (for winter still lingered that far north, he could see the proof of his breathing). But once she was gone, she was gone. Perhaps the fires were no help to her that close to the edge of the world. 

So they sent the Tall Talker, Horn-blower, Breaker of Ice, Thunderfist, Mead King, Husband to Bears, Speaker of Gods, mistaken King of the Free Folk. He was of the North, surely he could survive and bring the wayward home. But the moon waxed and waned again and again and again and no one heard or saw him. He didn't even send a raven.

If the Onion Knight, Hand to two Kings, Admiral of the Narrow Sea, the smuggler, peasant from Flea Bottom, couldn't bring him home and find the lost, then no no one could. But he trudged back to Winterfell alone. They asked him what had happened, for that was always his role, to tell of others' failures. Davos said he'd first come across Melisandre's gold and ruby collar, half-buried in the snow, then a bit farther, the arm bands Tormund had so treasured. He took them out from beneath his cloak, laid them on the table so the rust of blood shone in the firelight. "What else did you see?" they asked him. "Any sign of him?"

"Aye, I saw him. I recognized the wolf, massive thing, red eyes. Growled at me. I said to him, I said,  _I know you, Your Grace, you have to come home._ Then he lunged at me. More wolf than man. He'd have taken off my fingers if they weren't already gone, I swear it."

They were so defeated by his words: extinguished eyes, shoulders eroded. "So there's no saving him?"

"I'm afraid not. He's too far gone."

The Lady of the Keep stood up then- the northern girl, Winterfell's daughter, Lady Lannister, Lady Bolton, bastard of the Vale, little bird, princess who once hoped to be queen. She preferred to listen rather than speak, but she made her voice clear now. "Forgive me, Ser Davos, but you're mistaken. Have you all forgotten that I am the one who tends to his sleeping body while he wargs? I know his condition best, and he is  _not_ too far gone, as you say. There's hope yet."

"He's killed his attempted rescuers. I was lucky to escape with my life. How can we ask anyone to embark on a thankless quest?"

"I'll go," Sansa said. 

"My Lady, you can't, it's too dangerous!" they all protested, raising a clamour and a din throughout the hall. She'd grown beloved in her cousin's absence.

Sansa remained resolute. "He won't hurt me."

***

She kept his slumbering body in a forgotten bedchamber. Even his inhales and exhales were almost too subtle for her eyes. His heartbeat, no matter where she put her hands, on his neck, wrists, chest, was always glacial. If not for the rapid darting of his closed eyes, she would think him dead. 

She spoon fed him broth and water. She watched him grow thin. It had been almost a year. She trimmed his beard, stripped him bare and ran a cool cloth along his winter pale limbs. She read to him- sometimes the books and numbers of Winterfell, more often the latest poems, once even a fantastical story of the War for the Dawn. " _Clad in Targaryen colors, his violet eyes blazing, Aegon Targaryen advanced on the hordes of the dead-_ oh, I can't finish this without laughing," she said. And when the moon was full and she didn't need candles to see, she'd sing for him and no one else the songs of her youth. It was easier to pretend in the half-light. 

The night before she departed for the north to go save him, she bestowed a kiss on his brow. His skin wasn't warm or cool. She didn't linger. He wasn't really there; it was a only a ghost of the man she knew.

***

When she reached the boundary between the world and the wild, the sky had descended as mist among the sharp black pines. The sun was rising. It was early. She didn't want to have to beat the inevitable evening in order to have time to do what she needed to do. Light bled into the fog, gold and silver, amber and azure. Sansa couldn't see what lay before her. Each step was a risk, but faith had carried her this far, so why let doubt hold her back now?

She heard him running circles around her, prowling in the trees just out of sight. She spun around, but he was beyond her. She stopped, stilled. She willed her heart to be calm, knowing he would scent her fear and her hope. When she knelt down in the thin layer of snow, he approached. He was cautious, she was cautious. 

His black lip was curled up over his shining fangs. His red eyes were narrowed with something Sansa couldn't name- recognition? Fury? Fear briefly ran down her spine, spread throughout her body and froze her in place. Melisandre couldn't bring him back, Tormund couldn't remind him of who he had been, Davos couldn't coax him, and surely he loved her least of all of them. Then she shook her head. "Jon is Jon," she murmured, remembering her conviction in his goodness years ago. Since then they'd both disappointed each other, but this was her chance to undo all that.

The wolf didn't come any closer, but he wasn't running away. "Jon," she said in her gentlest voice, the one that had deceived almost everyone- Joffrey, Cersei, Petyr- that she was harmless, nothing but a stupid, vulnerable girl who cared too much. The wolf cocked its head. Encouraged, Sansa reached out her hand, choosing to disregard Davos' story. The wolf stepped towards her once, twice, until he was close enough to brush her numb fingers. He gave a quick lick. 

Sansa smiled. She could feel the cold reddening her cheeks. Then suddenly the wolf turned and seemed ready to give chase, flee into the woods where she couldn't follow. "Jon, don't you dare!" she commanded in the tone she usually reserved for the most unruly subjects and stubborn lords. "Come here."

Almost sheepishly, the wolf loped back, closer than before. Sansa rested her hand on the soft scruff of his neck. "Don't you want to come home? I think you do, you just don't know how. We're waiting for you. I know you must have seen things, in the war. Unimaginable things. But spending the rest of your life here, living through an animal, it won't really ease the pain. I think you know that. Come home."

"I think I know what the others did wrong," she continued. The wolf was licking her face now, covering every exposed inch of skin. "They weren't looking for  _you_ , not really. They were looking for the king, for Aegon Targaryen, for the Lord Commander, for people you're not anymore, or people you never were. But I know you. You're Jon Snow."

The third time she said his name, Sansa noticed a strange shift in the wolf's eyes. The red briefly changed to a more human grey, and in the moment between reverting, the color seemed almost purple. Sansa recalled that ridiculous poem about the War for the Dawn, and laughed, even here in this place that she couldn't picture as being any desolate. She tapped her leg to summon him, the way she used to with Lady."Let's go home. Come on."

***

In the forgotten room in Winterfell, Jon sat up. It reminded him of waking, clutching the wounds in his chest that no one should ever see in themselves, staggering for welcoming arms. "Sansa?" he said.  

Ghost, himself again, curled at the foot of the bed, beside the fire, pricked up his ears. Sansa looked up as well from her seat. She finished one last stitch. "Finally," she said in an impatient way, but she didn't try to conceal her smile. She stood, set down her needlework, and went over to the bed to embrace him. Ghost gave a contented sigh to see all was as it should be, then returned to resting. 

**Author's Note:**

> heard a legend that to cure a werewolf you had to go on a full moon & say his name three times, so....


End file.
